Grand Prize...

While professing our love for dönners at lunch the topic of conversation turned to race. It started with an anecdote about a mayor of a major German town making some disparaging comments about Turkish people (remember a dönner is a Turkish sandwich) and how amazing it is that someone with those views can advance that far in politics. Of course I had to inform my counterpart about the unfortunate reality of things. With this topic we eventually segued into a discussion about Nazis, their continued presence throughout the world, racism, and Hitler. It turns out that much like the Chinese censorship over all things democratic, ze Germans censor most things Nazi related... A quick check back through the photo archive shows that the communist stand in Berlin had 'Russian' items only, whereas in Rome you can buy a pocket watch with Hitler's face on it... For instance, in the newly released Call of Duty , which takes place in WWII, ze German copies of the game have the swastika removed from the German flags etc. So if you're playing online in the states with some Germans here, your screen will have swastikas on the German flags while theirs do not. What does this rant about censorship have to do with the grand prize you may be asking yourself... In jest it was suggested an autographed copy of Mein Kampf be the grand prize for the comment contest. The problem is that with the censorship of ze Germans, I cannot purchase Mein Kampf at the local bookstore. A non-German copy wouldn't be nearly as hilarious a prize so it's back to the drawing board.

BERLINROME

Also an interesting query that I must follow up on: What do they teach in history class in Great Britain? How do they treat the American revolution and such events as the Boston tea party? History is usually written by the victor, but at the same time, what do the history books of the loser say?